Collinsville Soccer Finally Returns to Action

By Mark Jurgena

Photo: PazImages

Collinsville’s boys soccer team missed their chance to play fall soccer due to the COVID-19 shutdowns, but they didn’t miss their opportunity to put up an impressive win in the new “spring” season as they buried Belleville West at Kahok Stadium in a midday contest March 13th.

“It feels great to be honest with you,” CHS coach Rob Lugge said. “Getting the boys out there and seeing the excitement of having them on the field and having a few fans in the crowd yesterday, it was surreal. It was nice to be back to some sort of normalcy.”

CHS got the scoring started barely eight minutes into the opening half on a beautiful goal by the Kahoks.

With the ball in the midfield area, CHS came up with possession of the ball and sent it wide down the left side. Jimmy Crowder won a 50-50 ball in the corner and fired a pass off his left foot in front where Baker redirected it into the net.

“Jimmy, he did a great job of winning that ball back, picking his head up, and hitting that ball with some pace across the goal mouth and lucky for us Tagg was there,” said Lugge. “He was good enough to put that ball into the corner.”

Late in the half Collinsville secured their second goal again on a rush from the left side.

Jackson Parrill was able to head a free kick off the boot of West’s Alex Stogner. Parrill was able to secure possession and Adam Reiniger got it to midfield. Luis Fernanadez battled for the 50-50 ball and got it to Trey Peterson who flew down the left side with a West defender on him. He fired it low on goal and off West goalie Wyatt Coughlin into the net with 7:00 to go in the half.

“For Jackson being a multi-sport athlete and only playing soccer a few months out of the year, he does an amazing job,” said Lugge. “Trey as a freshman has had a huge impact on us. His ability to get up and down a wing and play strong defense, but attack like he did yesterday…for him to get that goal in his first game at home as a Kahok, it was a big moment for him.”

Baker scored again to wrap up the scoring.

With CHS attacking all half, Will Martin came up with the ball and got it to Luis Fernandez at the top of the box. Fernandez found Baker on the right side and he fired it into the lower left corner of the net with 25:00 to play.

Carter Wagner and Miguel Gaspar combined for eight saves in goal for CHS.

Edwardsville 3 Collinsville 2 (OT)

Collinsville began the year with a tough shootout loss at SWC rival Edwardsville on March 9th.

CHS had to fight back to tie the game twice in the 2nd half.

Crowder picked up a goal and assisted on Yahir Figueroa’s game-tying goal with just under 20:00 to play.

CHS ended up losing 5-4 in the shootout.

“It was our first game in like 500 days?” began Lugge. “Getting out there with a bunch of new starters, some young kids, but the day as a whole, while we’re disappointed with the loss, was a pretty good feeling. Being able to walk out of Edwardsville, taking the most dominant team in our conference to PKs we were excited whenever we left.”

Kahok Notes: When CHS played West, it ended the athletics drought at Kahok Stadium. A total of 505 days elapsed between games due to COVID-19 shutdowns. The last contest had been a 28-0 loss to Centralia for the Collinsville football team on October 25, 2019. Those stats were courtesy of Christopher Kettler on Twitter and Todd Duke of the Kahok Sports Network.